Dying Light: The Following is in my top 10 list of best pieces of DLC. It has so much content, a rich story that can be enjoyed without having any knowledge of the original game’s story. It also introduces a new setting that features new challenges and ways to traverse the land.
Dying Light: The Following starts out with you finding out there are a group of people living outside of Harran who are completely immune to the zombie infection. Hero of the original Dying Light, Kyle Crane, jumps at the chance to escape from the hell that is Harran and find a cure for this terrible infection. He follows a map that leads to an area only referred to as “The Countryside”. This is where you will find some of the scariest threats in the game. Infected children turned into walking rotting corpses who scream so loud it can kill you. Men and women turned into monsters that spit acid at you or explode like a pinata filled with their guts and blood. Giant mutated men with cement and metals stuck to them protecting them from your bullets and other attacks. Up close and at a distance, these characters have some absolutely haunting designs. It’s something that only a horror mastermind like Sam Rami or Guillermo del Toro could come up with. It gives me chills when I see some of these zombies!
If you’re like me and haven’t played Dying Light in close to a year, you’ll find yourself facing some challenges but not in a bad way. It’s like you’re playing the game for the first time and it’s a refreshing feeling to learn the ropes all over again except in a new environment. The new playable area is open and isn’t in a claustrophobic city with lots to climb around on. It’s mostly open fields and small farms filled with hordes of zombies meaning running and climbing is not the best way of traversing the lands.
So, how does one travel through these areas of vulnerability without getting mauled by zombies? How about a highly customizable dune buggy? Within the first roughly 45 minutes of The Following you are alerted to the presence of a nearby dune buggy for your personal use. This will be your main mode of transportation throughout your stay in The Countryside. As you progress throughout The Following you will need to be on the search for fuel and parts to keep the vehicle from falling apart. It makes it feel like you truly are a survivor in this once-lively world, crafting your weapons with duct tape and scavenging for fuel and screws in old abandoned cars. The dune buggy is really a piece of junk when you first get it, taking it off of paved roads will cause it to take damage but you can craft better suspension, engines, traction, brakes and other parts that will make your car more durable to the environment. Not only can you improve its general performance, but you can make it a lethal machine. A true wrecking machine. You can electrify the outside of your dune buggy so zombies can’t leap onto the side of it and reach in and attack you, add flame throwers that ignite the crowds of the undead into a burst of flames, and you can even add a mine dispenser to the war machine to blow away any Volatiles or Virals chasing you down. It’s not just a mode of transportation, it’s a full blown weapon and defense system on wheels. If you’re terrified of the night in Dying Light like me, the dune buggy can even protect you from that by adding UV lights that burn the nasty Volatiles and keep them off you. It doesn’t stop there though, you can find bobble heads and paint jobs out in your travels to further personalize your war machine. The funny part is that the bobble heads are actually characters within the game, it kind of makes you think “Who is producing bobble heads of these very random people in the zombie apocalypse?”. It’s a funny little touch that I think adds some much needed humor to the dark world of Dying Light.
The dark story of The Following is brilliant. You must find this cult who worship a god who guards a potential cure for the zombie infection. The only question is, are these people just insane and blind, worshiping a god with no power or do they really have something that not even money could buy? As Kyle Crane, you must infiltrate this cult and find out what is really going on. You will find weird, supernatural things that change Kyle’s perception of things. It’s never explicitly said if Kyle begins to believe in this religion, but it’s an idea that is played around with an interesting way that I won’t really get into due to some minor spoilers. Without getting into too much detail, the ending for this DLC was much more satisfying than the one for the original Dying Light story. Don’t worry, there are no QTE boss fights to be found here! It’s a satisfying conclusion with a twist that is sad, brutal and twisted. It’s a great story that I think any Dying Light fan will enjoy. If you are even remotely on the fence about buying this, don’t be. It is brilliant and only $20. For the amount of content they put in it, it could’ve easily been $30-$40 and made a standalone expansion.
One last thing I would like to touch on is the variety of content out in the world. Some of my favorite parts of The Following come from the Fatin and Tolga questline, the two hilarious and hurtful twins who you may remember from the original game. They get stranded in The Countryside after a failed escape plan from the city of Harran. They call upon you to help them conjure up another plan to escape the zombie-ridden city. While it is mostly just a giant fetch quest, the humor the characters provide in between quests and over the walkie-talkie is absolutely hilarious. They insult your character and treat you like a dumb dog. They say some of the funniest and meanest things and Kyle just sits there and takes it. The way the quest ends is surprisingly funny as well but I won’t spoil it. If you end up purchasing this DLC see this quest to the end!
The game has many other side quests and you could probably spend over 15-20 hours playing the game! It’s filled with fun, brutal and emotional stories. The last side quest I will touch on is one where you find a note on a bulletin board. It mentions that they heard terrible screams coming from a well. They thought it could be a cat or maybe a human trapped down there, so you go to investigate. What you find is something so haunting I will probably never forget it. As you leave, you walk out of a cave and find something that makes it even more heartbreaking and haunting. It’s truly a great quest and is only around 10-15 minutes long.
The game loves to toy with your emotions. At one point I randomly came across a car looking over a cliff and when I walked around to the hood of the car to scavenge some parts, I found a couple lying there, holding hands, looking at the sky, with blood spilled across the hood and windshield. This is the kind of environmental storytelling that needs to be in more games. When a game shows you something as powerful as that just by using the environment, that is beautiful and brilliant storytelling.
Summary
Dying Light: The Following is an experience that needs to be played by all fans of Dying Light and anyone who just enjoys a really good game! The Following tells beautiful stories, introduces new gameplay mechanics, and builds on the fun gameplay moments of Dying Light. If you haven’t picked up Dying Light yet, now is a time better than ever with the “Enhanced Edition” that includes every piece of DLC including The Following and the main game for just $60. I can’t wait to see what Techland does next with the Dying Light series whether it’s in the form of DLC or a sequel.
Cade is a games journalist, Gaming Writer at ComicBook.com. They contributed 108 articles to ICXM between 2015–2017, focused on opinion pieces, game reviews, and Xbox news: served as Editor-in-Chief at GameZone before joining ComicBook.com.